MANILA, Philippines — Over the past couple of years, milk tea and bubble tea places have made a comeback in a big way. More than 10 years ago, Easy Way, the original branches of Quickly and Zagu attempted to introduce the concept of milk tea, but it seems like the Philippine market wasn’t ready for it. Now, like a perfectly aged tea leaf, the market is ripe for the picking. It seems as though everyone is lining up at one or more of the popular milk tea places, like Chatime, Serenitea and Gong Cha. Everyone but us, that is. You see, we have a confession to make: We can’t stand tea.
Yes, it’s true. Tea is the Kryptonite to our Superman. Luckily for us, we are not really Superman (or are we?!), and we can actually try to remove our aversion to tea for the love of all things delectable. Even better, Chatime Philippines gave us the opportunity to go to Taiwan, and see the secrets behind great milk tea, and why it deserves the hype.
Of course, it would have been the height of irresponsibility if we went to Taiwan without knowing anything about Chatime and its products. Also, that tea aversion clearly had to be remedied, and we had exactly a week to do it.
Okay, we’ll be the first to admit that perhaps 20+ tumblers of Chatime in a week WAS overdoing it. We did cheat the first few times by ordering the Chocolate Mousse, which contained no tea. Why? Because it was made of chocolate, and because it was there! We had to remind ourselves of our main mission after the fourth Chocolate Mousse, and had the Matcha Red Bean Milk Tea, which took about two tumblers to fully convert us. Convert us, it did, though! It was like sipping a lush Asian dessert. After that, we were more than willing to sink into serious tea territory. Yes, it wasn’t good for the state of our wallet, but man, were we energized beyond belief! That turned out to be a good thing, because we needed all that energy, and more, in Taiwan.
After packing our bags on Sunday, we decided not to sleep anymore, for fear that we wouldn’t wake up early enough for the flight. Fortunately, we were running at full tea power, so we’re content with the short nap that we took during the flight.
On our first day in Taiwan, we went around Taipei, and partook of whatever gastronomic pleasures the city had to offer. We knew we were in for a few good meals, but as we staggered back to our hotel, we realized that the food was better than we had expected. We slept like hibernating bears, but not for long. On Day 2, the real work began. We woke up before first light because it was the day we were going out of the city to visit the tea farm in Nantou where Chatime gets its supply of tea leaves. Afterward, we would pay a visit to the Chatime and the La Kaffa (the mother company of Chatime) headquarters.
It took about three hours for us to reach the tea farm, and we spent the bus ride either checking out the sights, marveling at the proximity of the urban areas to the mountains, or snoozing. The tea farm was not as big as we had imagined, but it was still breathtaking to actually be amidst the greenery, knowing that the tea that we had been drinking the week before came from this field. At the farm, we learned about the life cycle of a tea plant, and we went over the process of drying and roasting the tea leaves. We were shocked to find out that drying and roasting the leaves took less than an hour; but then, we were told that the entire process of selecting the leaves, mixing them with other breeds and fermenting them was a much longer and complicated process. We also found out that the best tea always came from high mountains, dashing our hopes of growing our own tea plant outside our window. It was a very fascinating tour, punctuated by crop-related anecdotes from Johnlu Koa, the founder and CEO of French Baker, which brought Chatime to the Philippines.
Before leaving for the La Kaffa headquarters, we had lunch at the farm’s restaurant. Most of the dishes contained, you guessed it, TEA! The flavors were not as sharp as the other Taiwanese dishes’, but we could really taste the freshness of the ingredients, the clean flavors and the hint of smokiness from the tea. Our bellies filled, and our other senses tingling from the beauty and peacefulness of the surroundings, we left the farm with a sense of longing. But it was almost immediately replaced with excitement at finally being able to visit the headquarters.
When we finally reach our destination, we are excited to try the tea again, now that we’ve had a behind-the-scenes look at where its raw ingredients came from. As the staff lined up the different products for sampling, our first thought was, “Déjà vu!” followed by, “Woo-hoo! No queues!” It quickly became apparent that we had no room for dozens of drinks, in spite of our best efforts, but hello, what’s this? A tiny paper cup? If you have never tried ordering multiple drinks at Chatime and taken milk tea shots, then we suggest that you start now. Obviously, the mousses have a special place in our heart, but we surprise ourselves when we actually enjoy and prefer the Black Tea and Wintermelon Tea with very little sugar. A convert, at last? Definitely.
After our tea for two dozen, we went up to the office of La Kaffa and Chatime founder and CEO, Mr. Henry Wang. We were a little taken aback by his apparent youth, and his decision to leave the technology sector to start a bubble milk tea business. When he tells us the story of how he created a method of brewing tea for multiple servings after he thought it would be better if tea places could mass-produce their drinks instead of making each customer wait for an individual serving, it all became clear. This man had a vision, and his technology background served him well. It’s no secret that Chinese people love their tea, but Chatime aims to cater to a wider audience. How are they planning to do this in places where tea isn’t king? “We have other drinks, like the mousses, juices, smoothies and QQ Jelly drinks that they can sample first before they move on to our teas,” said Henry. According to him, their target market is the 15-30 age group, but they do get customers from outside that demographic. As for the man himself, what does he drink? Does he prepare to start a war whenever Chatime runs out of tapioca pearls, like the rest of us? He grins and says, “I like my tea plain.”
Well, we haven’t quite reached the tea-loving level of Mr. Henry Wang, but we’ll get there, one Chatime tumbler and one Chatime queue at a time.
article source: mb.com.ph
